


Riddle of the Self

by Opalgirl



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Character Study, Community: 31_days, F/M, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-26
Updated: 2011-05-14
Packaged: 2017-10-18 17:03:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 30
Words: 9,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/191169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Opalgirl/pseuds/Opalgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of loosely-connected one-shots/drabbles based upon the <a href="http://31-days.livejournal.com/2521268.html#cutid1">June 2010</a> prompt set from <a href="http://31-days.livejournal.com/">31_days</a>, focusing on Commander Petra Shepard (Paragade/Earthborn/War Hero/Vanguard).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prompt: there exists a world

**Author's Note:**

> I saw that prompt set and my brain went into overdrive--they're perfect Mass Effect prompts--and so this was born, a sort of character study. Fair warning: Petra has a mouth like a sailor.

_‘Someday, when this is all over…’_

If she was paid for every time she said that, Petra Shepard is pretty sure she’d be the richest woman in the galaxy. _Jesus_.

And it’s never ‘over.’ There is _no such thing_ as ‘over’, so saying that is stupid.  _It’ll be over when you’re dead—again_ , she thinks.

Looking across the warehouse, she sees one of the agents sent to kill her— _hey, you. Illusive Man. Fuck you_ —move behind a crate. Before she can even raise her hand in a signal, Garrus takes him out.

“Scoped and dropped!” the turian shouts triumphantly and she shakes her head.

 _That’s it. I am_ done _with this ‘people running around trying to kill me’ shit._ Done. _When this is all over, I’m retiring to somewhere quiet, and the universe can solve its own goddamned problems. There’s got to be somewhere nice and quiet where nobody can find me, with the occasional band of mercs for me to pick off._

More movement at two o’clock. She focuses her biotics and sends the agent flying into the air, pulling him toward her and her shotgun fire. _Yeah. ‘Cause I’d miss this._


	2. Prompt: a constant strain on reason

“I don’t know what the hell game that bastard thinks he’s playing,” she says, sitting on a crate in the Battery, “but I’m not his goddamned _toy_.”

Garrus nods seriously. “Even if he did devote an absurd amount of resources to putting you back together.”

Shepard bites the inside of her cheek in anger. “If he wanted a _toy_ , he should’ve put the damn chip in my brain and then I’d be too stupid to know better. Never _again_. I don’t play games, and I’m sure as hell not playing with _him_.”

“You know, there’s a reason everyone you run into warns you not to trust the Illusive Man,” Garrus points out. “That would be why.”

“Yeah, but-- _son of a_ _bitch_. You never— _never_ —send a fucking squad in blind. Even the idiots in Alliance High Command know that. It’s a sure way to get someone killed, and it’s not a ‘test’ when it could have gotten us all killed—even me. I think….” She sighed. “I think, between Joker’s requisition orders for windshield wipers and _this,_ it’s another test to see if I’ll lose my shit.”

“Windshield wipers?”

“Uh-huh. I think he thinks he’s being funny. If the Illusive Man ever decides to ‘test’ me again and someone gets hurt because of his bullshit, I _will_ hunt his rat-bastard holographic ass down and make him pay.”


	3. Prompt: the heavens still keep their secrets

Just when Petra thinks she’s seen it all (thirteen years of Alliance service, she has damned near seen it all) the galaxy goes and shows her something new, something different.

A reasonable batarian. An elcor bouncer with a sense of humour. A backwater colonial settlement where she isn’t recognized on the spot and followed. A restaurant on the Citadel that happily caters to dextro _and_ levo-based lifeforms, with staff that don’t bat an eye at a human-turian couple.

Then there’s the fact that Garrus can _dance_. Her turian can _move_ , all right, and she wonders just where he’s been hiding this.


	4. Prompt: there is little gossip among the stars

There’s a reason, she thinks, why she prefers space. Give her a ship with a good crew and a star chart any day over life planetside. She’ll take the ten cubic meters of space per person, the bulkheads, and the freeze-dried food over the _talk_.

People will not stop talking about her, her love life, _anything_.

She can’t go buy a pair of shoes or go out to a club without being followed like she’s some sort of vid star. The gossip columnists run fake stories about her upcoming wedding (she and Kaidan have a good laugh over that one), a false rumour that she’s pregnant (yeah, right), that she and Kaidan are about to split up, and that she’s about to dump her “human boyfriend” (in these stories, poor Kaidan never even gets a _name_ ) for some asari stripper.

If it’s not the adoring media following her, it’s the Terra Firma assholes, wanting her to ‘endorse’ their cause, whatever the fuck _that_ means. How many times will she have to tell them _‘no’_ before they get it and go away?

Alliance Command is not impressed with the media coverage surrounding her; but it’s not _her_ fault. It’s not as if she goes out of her way to _encourage_ them.

“Jesus, what is so damned _fascinating_ about me ordering a drink?” she demands of a sneaky photographer one night, shaking off Kaidan’s warning hand. “ _Really?_ ”

The man shrugs. “It sells,” he replies and disappears into the crowd, his money likely made for the next month, and a photo to cleverly edit and run beside a gossip story of her flirting with a bartender instead of Kaidan or some shit.

Nobody follows her in space. It’s only when she’s groundside this happens. Screw planets and space stations. Get her back on a goddamned ship. Now.


	5. Prompt: conjuring oneself out of zilch

“What do you mean you don’t have a first name?” The Alliance recruiter who’s helping her with the paperwork takes the datapad from her and frowns. “You’ve got to have a name.”

“I dunno,” Shepard responds, shaking her head. “If I had a name other than ‘Shepard’, nobody ever called me it.”

“Hmm. And there’s nothing keyed to your ID either.” The recruiter shakes his head. “No birth record, no legal name, no record of childhood immunization or gene mods, no adoption or foster records. Well. You have a choice here—you can give yourself a name. What you’d liked to be called.”

She chooses ‘Petra’, after her former gang-mate. Petra had been tough as nails, but a sort of mother to the young kids who ran with the Reds, kids with no mothers. She kept them in line and made sure they ate, and if someone wanted out, she’d try to help them get away clean. Nothing could take Petra down—except for an explosive planted in her car one night.

The recruiter doesn’t ask about her new name and she doesn’t tell him. He knows she’s a street kid, but he doesn’t need to know about her gang ties. She’s not going to fuck up this chance. It might be the only one she gets.


	6. Prompt: he isn't just something he's imagining

“Down! Get _down!_ ”

A batarian rocket rips through the air between the lines, narrowly missing striking the cadet to her immediate right square in the face.

 _Hell of a way to end leave,_ Shepard thinks, _bunkered down while pirates try to kill us all with a bunch of half-trained kids and civilians on the front lines._

“Ma’am. Thank you, ma’am,” gasps the cadet, his grip on his rifle a little shaky. “Another second and…”

“You can thank me later,” she replies, peering up over the barricade to see what their attackers are up to. _Can’t see anything at all. Damn it._ “Anybody got a visual?” Shepard asks into her hardsuit radio. “What the hell are these bastards _doing_?”

“Got a visual, Shepard. They’re at your two and four, no movement.”

“Roger that, Corporal,” she replies. “Put some heat on ‘em, if you can. But don’t do anything stupid.”

“Aye, aye, ma’am.”

 _Hope to hell they don’t come around behind us. The squads on the rear can’t take any more fire and I’m running out of people_ fast. She bites her lip and looks around—Elysium’s garrison was raw cadets and servicemen and this would’ve been much worse if it wasn’t for the troops in the city on furloughs. If she can _somehow_ hold this one breach until reinforcements get in….

“Control,” she calls up to the communications tower, “what’s the ETA on those reinforcements?”

“Alliance vessels half an hour out, Service Chief.”

 _Fuck._ “Roger that, Control. Shepard out.”

 _Half an hour. Thirty minutes. It’s a hell of a lot longer when you’ve got batarians trying to shell the shit out of you._

“We got movement, Chief!” calls one of the servicemen, further down the line. “Two o’clock! Looks like they’re going to try again!”

She retrieves her rifle and leans up from behind the makeshift barricade. “Fire at will!” _If we’re going to get slaughtered down here, these bastards are going down with us,_ she thinks—and it’s the last thing she thinks before opening fire.

“This is Elysium Control, Service Chief Shepard,” says the calm voice of the controller in the communications tower, interrupting the steady sounds of gunfire. “Alliance vessels are within range, and reinforcements are about to land.”

“Roger, Control.” If she was religious, she might have said a prayer. Instead she switches the frequency on her radio and says, “we’ve got Alliance vessels incoming!”

The men on the lines cheer when the reinforcements hit the ground, with the cruisers making quick work of the batarian vessels. The pirates never know what’s hit them, and the fresh troops on the ground make it look easy. So easy she thinks for a minute that she might be imagining it.

Two squads come to help her cover the rear, and a marine in actual combat gear—compared to her civvies and scrounged armor—makes his way over and crouches next to her. “You Shepard?” he asks, tapping her hard on the shoulder.

She isn’t about to get up from behind cover, so she salutes from where she’s crouched down. “Service Chief Shepard, _SSV Cape Town.”_

He returns her salute. “Lieutenant Peters, _SSV Agincourt._ I hear you’re the one who held this breach.Nice work, Chief.”

“I’d thank you for the compliment, sir, but it wasn’t just me.”

“Yeah. You’re wounded, marine—get the hell out of here. We’ll take it from here. And—Christ, have you got _civilians_ on the lines?”

Only when he mentions it does she notice the burning ache running through her left arm. So long as it isn’t her gun hand. She shrugs. “Sir, the local garrison had nothing but green recruits and servicemen. We wouldn’t have held it this long without them. I think they’re within their rights to defend their home. Sir.”

The lieutenant scowls. “ _Stupid_ , to leave this undefended. I gave you an order, Chief—get _moving_.”

“Aye, aye, sir.”


	7. Prompt: the haunting riddle of the self

After Elysium, when the Alliance rewards her ‘heroic actions’—privately, Petra thinks she just did her job—with a medal and a promotion, she puts on her dress blues for the first time since graduation and wonders just who this woman is.

Operations Chief Shepard of the _SSV Cape Town_ is _not_ Shepard of the Tenth Street Reds. If she went back to Earth, looking like this, no one would recognize her. Fresh out of boot camp, she’d quietly replaced her rough gang tattoo with the Alliance insignia, tired of hiding it.

The old Shepard, who’d been involved in gun-running and smuggling and theft, wouldn’t go to awards ceremonies, that’s for sure. And, because it’s the Alliance, there has to be a ceremony involved. They can’t just give her the medal and call it day. First, they need to talk about it.

Someone bangs on her door. “Shepard! You shine those boots anymore, they’re going to fall apart!”

One thing her two lives have in common—there was always someone to yell at her, and probably always will be.


	8. Prompt: a longing pervades the world

Her fellow soldiers are infatuated by asari and it seems as if the asari are in every club come shore leave. They’re beautiful, elegant creatures and Shepard sometimes wishes _she_ could be as elegant and graceful as they are before she remembers that she’s a _marine_ , not a dancer.

She doesn’t much care for them. They’re pretty, but she can find pretty faces anywhere; that’s not the hard part. She has her crewmates and some of them she’d even count as friends, but it _would_ be nice to have someone, to have a home that isn’t a sleeper pod.

Shore leave, though, is the only time she really gets to meet people that it isn’t against the rules for her to have a relationship with—and she’s never met anyone in a club that she didn’t want to punch.

“You’re quiet.” the turian bartender says, his flanging voice jarring her out of her thoughts. “Not here to trash the place like your buddies, soldier?”

She leans her elbow on the bar and leans her chin on one hand. “Nope, but I can be if you want. I had planned to sit here and drink and watch and blackmail the shit out of them later. Because, Jesus, some of them can’t dance.” Honestly, neither can she, but nobody needs to _know_ that.

The bartender laughs, mandibles flaring wide. “I like it. Don’t help them trash the place—the boss hates it.” He tops up her drink, probably thinking she’ll tip him well. “If you Alliance types didn’t bring in so much money, she’d kick you all out.”

“Yeah. Not the first time I’ve heard that.” She raises her drink to the bartender and takes a sip, enjoying the burn of the alcohol as it goes down. “Marines’ll drink the bar dry and burn it down, that’s the saying.”

The turian snorts and nods. “I used to serve in a place where that actually happened. You keep drinking, maybe I’ll tell you about it.”


	9. Prompt: the dream picture pinches its own arm

When she gets her officer’s commission, Petra barely keeps from pinching herself. When she signed up, she’d seen herself as an enlisted woman, because no one would want a street kid from Earth in command. But here she is, a commissioned officer, re-assigned to the _Madrid_.

The first time she walks onto the bridge and a shout of “officer on deck!” greets her, only having been yelled at by Gunny Ellison keeps her from flinching or laughing.

She recalls the Gunnery Chief telling her, over and over and over again, that she wouldn’t amount to anything, that she wouldn’t have a career, and that she’d only been recruited because of her biotics. It was a tactic _meant_ to provoke her, to incite a response, to make her fight harder in training, but she sometimes had taken him seriously.

The “officer on deck!” thing is going to take some getting used to; she’s not sure if she likes being announced every time she steps through the airlock.


	10. Prompt: we are the riddle no one guesses

Being re-assigned is not a surprise. Personnel _likes_ to shuffle people around routinely—the joke being that it gives them something to do. Being reassigned to a first-gen, prototype frigate as the Executive Officer _is_. (What the hell is the Alliance _doing_?) Petra steps through the _Normandy_ ’s airlock and swears she can still smell paint.

“Hey—you’re Commander Shepard, right?” calls a voice from the cockpit.

She shoulders her bags and turns towards the voice. “That’s me.”

The man who’d spoken to her sits at the helm of this _amazing_ ship, a ballcap pulled low on his head. “Name’s Joker. You’ll be looking for the Captain. Hang on.” He turns around and brings up a comm link. “Captain? Your new XO, Commander Shepard? She’s just arrived. You wanna come up and give her a welcome or do I get welcoming party duty today?”

“I’ll be right there, Joker. Ask the Commander to wait,” replies another voice.

“Aye, aye, Captain. You got that, Commander?” the helmsman asks.

“Yep. I got it. Joker, huh?”

He huffs out a breath of air. “ _Technically_ , it’s ‘Alliance Flight Lieutenant Jeff Moreau’, but that takes way too long to say. Call me Joker.”

She nods. “You’ve got it, Joker.” Better to start off making friends than not, but she can’t help but think that this guy’s piloting skills must be off the damn charts for the Alliance to keep him.


	11. Prompt: the fairy-tale trapped in its own image

“But you’re a hero!” follows her everywhere. Along with “the Shepard I knew would never work for Cerberus!” and “What are _you_ doing with Cerberus?”

 _Yeah, because I got to_ choose _what creepy pro-human organization resurrected me, you know, being_ dead. The whole thing nearly makes her makes her mad enough to spit. Old friends keep her at arms’ length, she’s got no hope in hell of getting help from anyone she used to know, and she’s got Cerberus sheep at her six for lack of anyone else.

(Fine. Maybe they’re not _strictly_ ‘sheep.’ Jacob _seems_ sensible, like he hasn’t been drinking too much of the Kool-Aid, but Miranda? Nope. Shepard’s not convinced).

People seem to think of her as some sort of fairytale hero, who never does anything wrong, never loses sleep at night over a decision, and who will always sweep in on a white horse—or in a white frigate—to save the galaxy.

When she’s _not_. She never has been and this is seriously starting to piss her off. She’s human and, yeah, sometimes she fucks up. When _she_ fucks up, it tends to be on a huge scale.  She’s let her temper get the better of her, spoken too quickly, made decisions she regrets, and made decisions she never wanted to have to make. Nobody ever thinks about that.

They just see her as their hero, their “saviour.” “But you’re a hero!” they keep saying, as if it’s going to change something. _Nope. Still need the Illusive Man’s backing. If you won’t help, it’s got to come from_ somewhere. _Saving the galaxy costs a goddamned fortune._

When ‘Archangel’, bane of every merc’s existence (revealed to be a turian at this distance), removes his helmet, she’s never been so glad to see a familiar face.

She can _trust_ Garrus on her six; she’s not just a multi-billion credit investment to him. _He_ put the final rounds in Saren’s head, was with her when Sovereign fell.

“Garrus! What the hell are you doing here?”


	12. Prompt: the cobweb of family secrets

“You didn’t tell me you’d kidnapped an infant,” she remarks, during the second lengthy elevator ride. “Why was that?”

Miranda frowns and then looks away. “I know how it sounds, Shepard. But my father—he didn’t want a child. He wanted a dynasty. I was never— _never_ —perfect enough for him. I wasn’t going to let him do something like that to Oriana. I gave her a family and let her grow up normally. She has friends. Crushes on boys. Her family loves her and doesn’t expect her to be perfect. Wouldn’t you rather that?”

Petra considers. “I don’t know,” she says, finally. “Come _on_ , Lawson—don’t look at me like you’ve never read my file. You _know_ I’m a street kid from Earth and that I never had a family. I don’t know what that is. All I know is what’s in the old vids and real people don’t live like that.”


	13. Prompt: gloomy anthropoid apes

The destroyed shells of human beings, the colonists in stasis on Horizon and the wreckage of the Normandy, the crew’s personal effects scattered across Alchera. The dead bodies at her feet on Tuchanka, Illium, Omega… and worst of all, the deserted colonies.

 _What the hell is the_ point? She wonders. _This isn’t going to_ stop _. Stop the Collectors. So what? We’re just going to find some other enemy, some other fight. If we can’t protect one colony, how can we protect an entire_ planet _? Especially if nobody wants to agree_ _and get their shit together in time. I’ve seen merc bands sworn to hate each other agree to work together faster than some ‘allied’ governments._ __

She won’t tell her crew this; they need her to keep morale up, so she keeps those thoughts to herself. Occasionally, she takes out her frustration on a punching bag down in the gym.


	14. Prompt: through the mist, above the mist

The Williams family’s waiting groundside. Shepard pulls on the gloves that went with her dress blues and took a breath. There’s nothing else for it. She’s as immaculate as a marine can be, her buttons and boots polished to a shine, her uniform crisp and pressed.

She doesn’t _have_ to go down; they’re likely expecting an Alliance chaplain or ensign, not the commanding officer. But she left Ashley to die, she made that call, and she has to deal with it.

Four women await her on the docking bay, all but one dressed in civilian clothes.

The young woman wearing dress blues to match Shepard’s own steps forward and salutes. “Commander Shepard, ma’am. Servicewoman Williams, 32nd Frontier Division.”

 _Ash’s sister_ , she realizes. _Has to be_. “Commander Shepard, _SSV Normandy._ At ease, Servicewoman,” she replies, giving her own salute. _Ash was serious about the crap postings for her family. The 32 nd’s out in god-knows-where on pirate duty. _

“Commander.” The woman who _had_ to be Ashley’s mother steps forward, nodding. “Angela Williams. Ashley’s mother.”

Shepard pauses, wondering just what she can say to this woman. _I’m sorry I couldn’t save your daughter? I’m sorry that I had to leave her behind to get killed?_ “Mrs. Williams, I am so, so sorry.” She extends her hand, bowing her head.

Angela Williams returns her handshake with an impressive grip for a civilian. “I know how the Alliance operates,” she says, resting one hand on her uniformed daughter’s shoulder. “You coming down to meet us isn’t standard procedure, Commander.”

Shepard bites her lip and locks her hands together behind her back. “I got your daughter killed, ma’am. The least I could do was come down here and look you in the eye, instead of sending a chaplain.”

“I—I respect that, Commander. It’s an honor. Thank you.”

She shakes hands with the younger Williams sisters, including Sarah, the youngest—who’s clearly trying hard to put on a brave face.

“It’s Sarah, right?” she asks the girl.

“Yeah—yeah, that’s me. That’s Abby and that’s Lynn,” Sarah says, pointing to each of her sisters in turn, her voice a little shaky.

“Your sister….” _Oh, damn it. Shepard, you can’t cry. You_ don’t _cry._ “I don’t know if ever she told you, but she was so proud of you. She talked about you—all of you—a lot. She loved you.”

“She did. Ash wasn’t quiet about anything.”

“No, not Ash,” puts in the uniformed Abby. “Never.”

 _‘Why is it when someone says ‘with all due respect’ they really mean ‘kiss my ass’?’_ Ashley’s voice comes back to her and Shepard nods, trying not to smile despite herself. “I—I’m sorry. I wish there’d been another way.”

Lynn holds up a hand. “Commander. It’s not your fault.”

“Ash was _always_ talking about Granddad and how we’d all been unfairly treated,” Abby says, shaking her head, her mouth thinning into a line. “She _said_ one of us would probably have to die a hero before that changed. I never expected it to be her, though.”

Angela wraps one arm around Sarah and the other around Lynn and says, “I was only ever a military wife, Commander, but I know a good fight when I see one. Ashley respected you, and, meeting you, so do I. She didn’t die for nothing.”

She can only nod. At least the family doesn’t blame her—not that it makes it any easier, really. “Thank you, Mrs. Williams. I hope I can make it so she _didn’t_ die for nothing.”


	15. Prompt: evolution's auto-pilot

The first time she goes out on the Citadel with Garrus, dressed in civilian clothes, looking for a _quiet_ drinks-and-dinner outing, they’re accosted by reporters.

The second time they try to go out, take a break, and cut loose a little, they’re accosted— _again_ —by one of those Terra Firma types.

 _Jesus, all I_ want _is a date_ , she thinks. _Is_ that _so hard?_

The man is talking about how her relationship with a turian is “unnatural”, how she has some sort of “duty” to humanity ( _bullshit_ ) to keep the species “pure”, and how there’s a “reason” she can’t breed with a turian.( _No shit. It’s called differences in biology, asshole)_ and is beginning to draw a crowd with his ranting. When he tries to tell her that she “belongs” with a human male, that’s it.

Shepard puts on her best “you’re being an _idiot_ , marine!” stare and stepsforward until she’s nearly nose-to-nose with the annoying bastard.

He swallows and looks away from her, then around for help. The gathering crowd is made up of different races—human, turian, asari, and there’s a krogan in the back who looks as if he’s there solely for the possible fight.

 _Good. Maybe_ now _you’ll shut up._ “If you’re smart, you’ll listen to me. We need friends. What good is your bullshit propaganda going to do if Earth gets blown to bits?”

“Commander—”

“It won’t do any good, will it? I’m not asking every human to pick an alien for their partner, but what gives _you_ the right to insult _my_ choice? We need to suck it up and make our peace, or else we’re screwed.”

“Humanity can look out for its own interests!” the man objects, earning a rumble of dissent from the humans in the crowd.

“No, we _can’t_. Not when it’s bigger than we are. Look at what was happening in the colonies—actually _look_. Oh, _for fuck’s sake_ , I didn’t come here to make a speech. This _turian_?” She points to a clearly amused Garrus— _I’ll kick you later_ , she thinks hopefully loud enough for him to hear—with her thumb. “He’s saved my skin more times than I want to think about. I’d rather have him at my back than some humans.”

“There must be an acceptable human for you,” the man protests, looking around at the crowd circling steadily closer. “You should love among your own species. Your children would be great….”

 _Oh, fuck you. You’re not listening_. “ _You_ don’t get to tell everyone else how to live their lives, buddy. I don’t stop you from spewing your shit, _you_ don’t get to tell me who I love. You wanna know something else about this turian? He’s the best damn sniper I’ve ever _seen_. He pissed off every merc in the Terminus and picked ‘em off, one by one. You know what that means, don’t you?”

The krogan whoops and stamps a foot, shaking the floor, the turians just look quietly pleased, and the asari are looking at Garrus as if he’s some sort of strange anomaly.

The card-carrying member of Terra Firma swallows visibly.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes.’ Now get the hell _away_ from me before he puts you in his sights. You’ve insulted his mate— _me—_ and his entire species. He wouldn’t even need an order from me.”

Garrus, taking the hint, stares down the cowardly asshole.

The idiot bolts, working his way through the assembled crowd, and disappears.

Shepard sighs, slumping her shoulders. “God. Rascist fucking _jackals_. I _hate_ them.”

“You didn’t shoot him,” Garrus points out, one hand resting on her shoulder.

“He’s got the right to spew his shit, whether I like it or not. That doesn’t mean I have to listen to him attack me.”

“Hrm. I would’ve shot him,” the krogan complains, before lumbering away.

“Commander? Officer Vakarian?” A slimmer and shorter than normal turian steps forward and the first thing Shepard notices is the lack of fringe on the back of their head. “Laelia Varius.” The voice is slightly higher, with less of a flanging effect. “C-Sec normally, but I’m off-duty.”

 _A female turian?_ She wonders, but shakes her head. She hasn’t seen one yet.

Garrus nods in acknowledgment and Shepard catches him scrutinizing the purple markings on her face. _Turian thing_ , she remembers. _That’s how they identify each other_.

“Garrus Vakarian.”

Varius’s mandibles twitch. “I know about you—and I’ve heard tell of your father. Listen, nobody gets paid enough to hear that crap. I think C-Sec must be asleep tonight. How about I buy you two a drink, to make up for it? That was quite the impressive speech, Commander. I think you’ve earned it.”

Shepard blinks. “I wasn’t trying to make a speech. Maybe someday I’ll drag ‘em kicking and screaming into this century, but I doubt it. We _were_ going to go for a drink, actually.”

“Then the first one’s on me.”


	16. Prompt: the universe is viewing itself in wide-angle

Jack leans back against the seat in the shuttle and folds her arms across her chest. “Not my type, but he’s pretty. You always pick the _pretty_ assholes, Shepard?”

She grimaces. No, she _doesn’t_ want to talk about this with Jack, but…. “He wasn’t always an asshole,” she says. _And_ why the fuck _are you still_ defending _him? He doesn’t deserve it._

 _Maybe because you still care,_ a part of her whispers. _Of course you do._

The old saying was that a sailor had a girlfriend in every port. As a young marine, she’d had a boyfriend on every station and that had lasted for a year or two. But then she’d given up. She’d been single and happy for several years, until she’d been reassigned to the _Normandy_ and then Kaidan had happened.

Kaidan, who’d loved her for _her_. Who didn’t give a damn that she’d run with a gang and didn’t see the Hero of the Skyllian Blitz when he looked at her.

He’d changed her view of the future, a little bit. Leading up to Ilos and in the months before the _Normandy_ was destroyed, she’d even considered _someday_ having a family with Kaidan, being _normal._ He was, in a word, _sweet_. He cared—and his good looks worked for him. He’d make some lucky woman _very_ happy, maybe.

She didn’t even recognize the Kaidan on the ground on Horizon, the two were so different. It pisses her off that he refused to listen to reason or to her explanation.

“Hey. They’re all assholes, Shepard. Give it up.”


	17. Prompt: the flight of the galaxies through space

“Those upgrades really saved our asses, Commander,” Joker says, his hands flying over the controls. “She’s still in one piece. I can do more than just get us to dock.”

“Yeah. Might need you to do that,” she says, leaning over his chair to read the damage reports. “Just… have to wait and see, I guess.”

Since she told the Illusive Man where to go— _politely_ even, she thought—they didn’t have a whole lot of options. The Alliance had made their stance clear and so had the Council, and she was _not_ about to let them interrogate her just to prove she wasn’t a shill for Cerberus.

“Yeah. That’s just gonna drive you crazy, huh?” Her pilot grins. “Nice one, telling the Illusive Man to suck it, by the way. That’s what I’d have done. But I would’ve done it a while ago.”

“Joker, that’s why _you_ do the flying and _I_ do the thinking,” she replies automatically—they banter back and forth so often that she doesn’t have to think about it.

He just snorts and says, “Yeah, yeah, whatever. Bringing her into dock, Commander.”

A thought occurs to her, as the docking apparatus clamps down on the _Normandy_ ’s hull. “Joker, y’know, this is the _second_ time you and me have stolen a ship?”

“Hey! I don’t think of it as ‘ _stealing’_ , Shepard. Just, uh, ‘liberating.’ You know, putting her to good use and all that. I don’t want to think of how Cerberus would treat my baby.”

 _If he could marry a ship_ , she thinks, deciding to keep it to herself, _he probably would_.


	18. Prompt: at the end of the secret path

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **SPOILERS for the new "ARRIVAL" DLC ahead**.

“ _Fuck._ ” The word drops from her mouth as soon as she steps out of the airlock onto Earth. “I _said_ ,” she says to the uniformed MPs waiting for her on the docking bay, “that I’d come quietly. You want to put the cuffs on me, then?”

The younger of the two MPs looks nervous. “Er. No, ma’am.”

“But,” the older one speaks up, “we do have to ask you to come with us, Commander Shepard, and we will have to secure your weapons and your vessel.”

“Fine. There’s a pistol, underneath my jacket. I’ll come with you without a fuss—as long as you swear not to harass my crew. It was my doing and mine alone,” she replies evenly, straightening her collar.

“Shepard!” Tali protests, voice rising in her worry, and she can _feel_ Garrus, tense at her back, ready to take them out and run.

“Alliance High Command already sent word, ma’am. Your crew are not our concern, although the alien nationals will have to pass through customs. If deemed necessary, our superior will provide a guard for the _Normandy_ against any threats.”

 _Oh, so they do mean to play nice? Huh._ “I appreciate it,” she replies, nodding her head. “I’m not in the mood for a pat-down. Can we do this like civilized people?”

The older MP, clearly the one in charge, nods. “You may turn your weapons over to us.”

She slowly unbuttons her jacket and slides the pistol from the holster, laying it on the ground in front of them. Knowing this was coming, she’d forgone the knives in her boots and her second sidearm, but going planetside without a weapon had felt wrong.

“Go, Tali,” she says, fastening the dress uniform jacket closed again. “Stay on the _Normandy_. I’ll be back. I have to answer to this.”

“Yes, Shepard.”

Garrus’s talons make a sharp sound, digging into the metal rail of the docking ramp, and the MPs both look at him.

“Garrus,” she warns. _Jesus, the_ last _thing I need is for them to decide to shoot him._ “Humans have legal process. They didn’t shoot me on sight. I knew this was coming.”

He nods, jaw and mandibles clenched. “If you say so, Shepard.”

“I do.” She looks directly at him and wonders if he can read human lips. “ _I love you_ ,” she mouths, anyway. If he can’t read her lips, then she’s never said it and she can feel less stupid.

Garrus touches his hand to his chest and bows his head.

 _So he does understand._ “All right, guys. Let’s go. If I find out my crew have been mistreated or harassed while they’re here, so help me…”


	19. Prompt: more vital than sane

When the lockdown is lifted— _Thanks, Captain. Hope you don’t catch fire for this—_ she’s behind Joker, waiting.

“We’re clear!” her helmsman shouts. “Go go go go!”

 _If we can get clear before Control catches on_ …. She isn’t a praying woman, but she does cross her fingers behind her back. She holds her breath as the _Normandy_ clears the Citadel ward arms and makes an approach run to the relay.

“Hitting the relay in 3… 2… 1….”

The ship jolts and Shepard braces herself on the empty gunner’s seat.

“Hey, Joker,” she says, when she’s gathered herself and remembered to breathe. “How do you feel?”

He frowns up at her. “Commander?”

“You just helped steal the most advanced warship in the entire Alliance fleet and you’re sitting next to a mutineer.”

He shrugs. “Needed to be done, Commander. _We_ know what’s out there and you’re not gonna get stonewalled by politics. This crew will back you up.”

“Good. Because I _was_ afraid they might band together and execute me.”

“Hell no. We’re not stupid. And you’d break me in half like a toothpick.”


	20. Prompt: wonder cannot be understood from the inside

When she’s shuttled off world for the first time, the huge signing bonus in her newly created bank account, Petra tries her damnedest _not_ to gape at Io as it looms closer. She’ll look stupid.

“You an Earth kid?” asks one of her fellow recruits from her side.

Her first, knee-jerk, reaction would’ve been to knee him or jam her elbow into his face because he’d snuck up on her. But that didn’t fly here. “Yeah.”

“First time off-world?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah. My parents took a land grant out on one of the colonies a couple of years back. First time I saw space.”

“Mmm,” she says, not interested. _Who’s this guy and why is he talking to me?_

“Name’s Kyle,” he introduces himself.

She barely manages to not roll her eyes at him. _Like I care_. “Mine’s Shepard.”


	21. Prompt: still we are the past together

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Recognizable dialogue is taken directly from the game.

“Shepard. Hey, Shepard!”

She looks at the man who’s standing outside of Chora’s Den and calling her name.

He sneers as she approaches. “They told me it was you, but I didn’t believe it. Shepard grew up and turned into a soldier.”

“Have we met?” she asks, folding her arms across her chest. _Every idiot in the galaxy. I swear._

“Name’s Finch,” he replies.

 _Finch_. _God damn it._ She fights down the impulse to reach for a weapon.

“You probably don’t remember me, but we ran together in the Tenth Street Reds. Maybe you don’t remember it yourself, running in a gang. None of the vids mention it when they’re talking about you.”

“So I ran with the Reds. That’s behind me now,” she says, glancing over her shoulder at Garrus and Liara, trying to see how her crewmates will react. Her old life is public record, and Garrus probably did look it up, but still.

“We’re not trying to cause you trouble, Shepard,” Finch replies.

“Bullshit,” she retorts. “Spit it out, Finch. What the hell do you want?”

“We just want a favour, for old times’ sake.”

 _Yeah. Of fucking course._ She glares and Finch continues.

“One of the Reds, Curt Wiseman, got picked up by turians. We’d like you to talk to the turian guard in the bar and get Curt out.”

“My gang days are over, Finch. Get the hell outta my way.” She makes to push him aside, and he says something about how the guard’s inside Chora’s Den if she “changes her mind.”

“Take care of this and you’ll never see me again,” Finch remarks, trying his damnedest to be threatening.

 _Yeah. You’re not scary._ Petra scowls at him. _Gunny Ellison was scarier than you_.

“You might not run with the Reds anymore, but you don’t want us as your enemies.”

 _I’ve got worse enemies than you_. She turns from him and makes her way into the bar, signalling her squadmates to follow.

When the turian guard reveals the nature of Wiseman’s crime—xenophobic hate crimes, specifically targeting turians as a species _—_ she decides that Finch needs her boot up his ass more than he needs his racist buddy released.

She won’t kill Finch but, as she talks, telling him that she doesn’t give a damn who he runs to with the story, she loosens her pistol in the holster as a warning. Finch bolts, the turian guard says he isn’t sure what sort of a Spectre she’ll make, and Shepard decides to get the hell out.

“Shepard,” Garrus begins, as they exit the bar.

Liara echoes the turian’s concern and Shepard resists the urge to snap.

“It’s nothing. I’d rather not talk about it.”

“For what it’s worth, it doesn’t make me think any less of you, Commander,” Garrus says, falling into position at her six. “If someone has a spotless history, it usually means it’s been scrubbed. Everyone’s got something like that to creep up and bite them in the ass.”

“Thanks, Garrus.” _Just my luck, I didn’t bring Williams or Alenko with me_. Her human crewmates, her fellow Alliance soldiers, tend to… idolize her. She’s a hero and she’s on a _very_ tall pedestal. They probably couldn’t even think of her having a history as a gun-running kid in a street gang.

“For a species with such a short lifespan, yours does seem to dwell on the past a great deal,” Liara comments. “I had expected more forward-thinking from humans. Perhaps I was mistaken.”

 _Yeah, you’ve got that right._  “You screw up once and that’s it,” she says, “mostly. The Council wouldn’t care, but some of the Alliance brass would, if they knew.”


	22. Prompt: it’s now, or never again

“Shepard… I….” Kaidan throws up his hands and then drops them, a clear sign of frustration. They’ve met on the Presidium, and the only thing going through Petra’s mind is _this_ _was a_ bad _idea._

She rubs her eyes tiredly and notices that _he’s_ looking at _her_. Well, if they’ve gone back to last names…. “What the hell do you want me to say, Alenko? ‘I’m sorry I was dead on an operating table for two years’? It wasn’t my fault, but if that’s what you want…”

“I loved you,” he says, looking her square in the eye. “I did.”

 _And then you accused me of betraying you, accused me of being a traitor and of abandoning you_. She bites her tongue—hard. “I know, Kaidan.”

“I buried you. Then, after Horizon, I read the files—and your message. I—I never should have said those things to you. I should have trusted you to do the right thing.”

 _Yeah, you damn well should have!_ But it’s not worth being angry over, not now. _Water under the bridge. Let it go._ She takes a breath, tries to get a grip on her temper, and waits, sensing that he’s not finished.

“I’m sorry,” he finishes, voice falling flat. “Maybe that’s not good enough, but I don’t know what else to say, Shepard. You’ve moved on. Maybe—maybe Garrus can give you what you deserve.”

He looks absolutely _wrecked_ by this—the conversation, her new relationship, who knows?—and it tugs at her. “I—Jesus, I’m sorry, Kaidan.”

“No. You moved on. Considering how much of an ass I was to you, you had every right.”

 _This might be the last chance you get to clear the air and fix this damn mess, so do it right,_ she thinks, shoving her hands into the pockets of her civilian trousers and says, “even though we didn’t work out, Kaidan, I’d like to still be able to count you as a friend.”

He tries a smile and nods. “Of course, Shepard—Petra.”

His use of her first name feels comfortable and familiar, just like old times. “Thanks. That means a lot.”

Kaidan reaches out, making as if to shake her hand. “I just—I hope you’re happy, Petra. You deserve that much. I’ve got nothing against Garrus—besides, he’s probably up there with me in his sights just waiting for me to do something stupid—and maybe he can treat you properly.”

“You’re sweet, Kaidan. A real romantic. You’ll make some lucky woman happy,” she says, extending her own hand. “Someone who deserves you more than I do.”


	23. Prompt: a mechanical doll that falls to pieces every night

“Hey, Commander, about those—you okay?” Joker’s voice switches gears halfway through his question as she steps onto the ship from the airlock and she sighs, holding her helmet in one hand.

 _Okay? I don’t know when the last time was that I was ‘okay.’_ “Nah, Joker. It’s nothing. Just tired. What’s up?”

Her pilot proceeds to talk about requisition orders and increased transit mass due to the ship’s new plating and larger new guns.  Things she knows she needs to pay attention to, but she just _can’t_.

Her head is splitting, the energy drink in the shuttle didn’t cut it—she needs real food and soon—and she smells like a varren. Her gear needs cleaning, she has messages she needs to get to, there’s a frightening number of reports waiting for her attention and she needs to place more requisition orders herself.

 _Fucking paperwork._ The paperwork would exist whether she was with the Alliance or with Cerberus, but that doesn’t make it any better. Her vision fades to grey, her head spins, and she leans on the gunner’s seat to collect herself for a minute, the stabilizers in her boots kicking in.

“Joker, put all that into a report for me. Forward it to Miranda, too. I’ll look at it later.”

“Aye, aye, Commander.” There’s no sarcasm in her pilot’s voice, no mocking tone. If anything, he sounds worried. “I’d just airlock half the damn paperwork, you know?”

“Yeah. The boss wouldn’t like that.”

 _So much for ‘improvements’,_ she thinks, walking across the CIC to the elevator. _Still feel as human and pathetic as ever after getting my ass handed to me._

She’s in no mood to take her dinner with the crew, to shoot the shit with Jacob or to have polite arguments that aren’t really arguments with Miranda. She wants to get out of this gear, eat, shower, and go to bed.  If she even gets that far. So she gets a meal tray from Gardner and leaves the mess. Her crew seems to get the message that she’s not in the mood for socializing and give her a wide berth, thankfully.

Once she gets up to her quarters, she strips out of her hardsuit, letting the pieces fall to the floor, and wriggles out of her clinging bodysuit and underwear. A quick shower and then she wolfs down her meal, hardly tasting it she’s so hungry.

When she finally struggles into bed, Petra wonders how long she can keep up this pace. No one can keep it up forever, but she might hold out a little longer.


	24. Prompt: floating in empty space

Some nights she dreams. Not of Elysium or Virmire or the Citadel. She doesn’t hear desperate comm traffic, the screams of dying men, or the last transmission from Ash at night anymore.

The dreams of her old life on Earth—car bombs, gun-running, and never knowing when she might be a target because of her gang ties—don’t wake her at night and haven’t for years, not since Basic.

She doesn’t even dream of the first time she woke up on the operating table on Lazarus Station, her senses distorted and her body a wall of pain any longer.

Instead, her dreams consist of disjointed memories. The force of the vacuum, sucking her out of the remains of the _Normandy_ , away from the escape pod. Her last real thought: _Hit that eject, Shepard. Now._ Drifting in open space, looking down at the planet below, the sensors in her hardsuit beeping endlessly, and realizing that she wouldn’t survive even if her suit held up.

Then her supply of breathable air disappearing, leaving her gasping and frantic. Trying to find the damage to her suit—not that she could fix it.

At least one night out of the ship’s week, she wakes up gasping for breath.


	25. Prompt: everything is as it was

The first time she strips down for a shower aboard the new _Normandy_ , Shepard looks herself over in the mirror above the sink in her tiny yet private bathroom. (Her own bathroom. After so many tours on Alliance vessels, it’s a novelty). Cerberus brought her back, all right.

Her battle scars—one passing through her right eyebrow, the other on her left bicep, both earned in the Blitz—and the jagged scar running up her leg from her days on Earth are gone, but her old Systems Alliance tattoo is still there on her right bicep, the ink beginning to show its age a little.

 _Huh_. _Took the scars, but left that_. Her skin looks and feels the same, though, and her hair’s the same colour, and when she runs her hand through it, it feels the same.

She’d thought something had felt different earlier and now the mirror proves it. _Someone_ working on Project Lazarus—definitely not Miranda--had decided she needed bigger breasts. Petra rolls her eyes at her reflection and moves on. 

The rest of her feels and looks the same. She’s not any taller than she was when she died, her feet and hands are the same size, and her body _feels_ like it’s hers. She can still use all of her years of combat training. She still knows how to take down a turian soldier one on one in two minutes and she still knows how to send a man twice her size flying across a room _without_ using her biotics.

It doesn’t feel strange like she thought it would. She’s still… herself. A gun still feels comfortable in her hand, she still knows the fastest way to get into a hardsuit, and she still has her memories.

And not just simple muscle memory for things like combat training, but actual memories. She still remembers the Alliance protocol drilled into her brain, the name of every ship lost in the battle for the Citadel against Sovereign, and Kaidan’s smile. Gunny Ellison yelling at her, Tali’s fascination with all things ship-related, and the exact way she’d been taught to put on her dress blues.

She’s back. And mostly the same, just as she was when she died. A few changes, and she understands from her first medical that she’s got a hell of a lot of tech installed—bone reinforcements, muscle weave, a new biotic implant—but she knows who she was and who she is.


	26. Prompt: an angel in distress

When he walks out of the elevator and into the deserted mess, he sees Shepard, seated at one of the empty tables.

She’s slumped over the table, her head resting on her folded arms, her posture defeated in a way Shepard’s just shouldn’t be.

If she does have moments like this—he thinks she has to—she’s never let her crew see them. Not ever.

Joker coughs to announce himself, because it just feels wrong to watch her, and makes his way over to Gardner’s domain. With a skeleton crew, it’s everybody for themselves when it comes to food.

Shepard raises her head, her grey eyes staring right through him. He knows that look. She’s thinking too hard. She’s blaming herself. They all are.

“I fucked up, Joker,” she says, her voice quiet and harsh. Her face is paler than usual, her freckles more prominent. “Don’t let Miranda blame it on you. She’s upset, even though she’ll never say it. It wasn’t your fault. It was mine.”

“You didn’t know. _We_ didn’t know. But we’re gonna get them back, Shepard.” He digs around in a cupboard, knowing that she’s probably not eating—and biotics like her, they need to eat.  _And it’s_ your _job to give these speeches, not mine. I just fly_.

“Don’t know that I can pull this one off,” she says, sounding weary. “I just… I do impossible shit three times a week, I know, but this….” She bites her lip and looks away from him. “This is big, Joker, and I don’t know that I can win. If it was _anything_ else, I’d say these were shit odds and walk away.”

She looks and sounds so exhausted and so _beaten_ that it worries him. This is Shepard. Even when the Council grounded the first _Normandy_ , she hadn’t sounded like this. She’d just gone out and found a way to get the ship back into the air. Even when Ash had been killed on Virmire with the salarian squad, she’d carried on.

She sighs. “Not that I’m going to, but—damn it, Joker, what the hell are you doing?”

He tries a grin. “Making my commanding officer a sandwich? Seriously, Shepard, you need to eat. You aren’t going to pull off a rescue mission on an empty stomach.”

“I’ll just puke it back up,” she says bleakly. “I appreciate it, but don’t bother.”

He sighs and hunts around in a drawer for a knife. “Don’t make me go get Garrus,” he threatens.

That gets him a laugh, even if it’s a bitter one. “What the hell can Garrus do?”

 _Peanut butter. Biotics are the reason this stuff’s in every ship’s rations, so, Gardner, where the hell did you hide it? A-ha._

He pulls the jar down and says, “Put you in his sights until you eat something? Thane could do that, too—though _he’d_ probably sit here and quote things at you until you got bored. I could get Zaeed down here to yell at you, but you’d probably just punch him and we don’t need that.”

“Funny, Joker. Peanut butter? Really? Am I five years old?”

He waves the knife at her. “You never _did_ learn how to cook, did you? ‘S okay. Neither did I. Maybe we can count on our shit cooking to drive away the Collectors.”


	27. Prompt: the door out of the fairy-tale stands wide open

She can walk away. Use the contacts her crewmembers have to go to ground, live off the grid. Essentially, disappear. Stop fighting with politicians who don’t want to listen to her and live like a normal human being on some backwater moon somewhere. She’s saved the universe’s ass twice now. She’s done her job.

Liara could help her disappear, if she wanted to. To somewhere in the galaxy where there’s no paperwork, no endless incoming messages, no nagging AIs, and no one demanding that she make decisions she doesn’t know how to make. Instead of being the universe’s hero, she could be an ordinary woman. With her skills, she could find work just about anywhere, after all.

But she’s not done. There’s a fleet bound for Earth. Disappearing and living quietly isn’t an option, not for her. She hasn’t finished her job.


	28. Prompt: the world will never return

If she makes the wrong decision here, there’s a good chance of Earth being destroyed. If Earth _isn’t_ destroyed, there’s a chance of other populated planets in the cluster—Luna, Mars—being destroyed or hit.

If she fucks up, she could take out a planet home to billions of humans—and while there are Earth-like planets capable of sustaining human life elsewhere in the galaxy, none of them are able to support that many people. She’ll have wiped out the human homeworld and everything that’s there. She doesn’t have fond memories of Earth, but some of her fellow humans do, and if she fucks up, it’ll all be gone. They’ll never be able to replace it.

 _Well, Shepard. You’d better not fuck this up._ She leans her head on her arms and mutters, “you know, once upon a time, decisions like this were _way_ the hell above my pay grade. I think I liked it that way.”


	29. Prompt: the land where even sleep doesn’t exist

“About us,” Garrus says and pauses, looking between her and the bed.

Shepard yawns and sits up, stretching her arms over her head. “What about us, Garrus?”

They’ve been up for hours now, well into the ship’s night. Getting to know each other, figuring out the differences and how they work, and remembering the old times. And now he wants to talk. She waits, letting one of her hands stroke the plates of his chest.

“Ah, damn it.” His mandibles twitch and his eyes meet hers. “I’m no good at this, Shepard.”

She nods. “Whatever’s on your mind, just say it.”

He gives a small snort of laughter and brushes one hand over her hair, a point of fascination for him earlier. “I—this wasn’t just about, uh, ‘blowing off steam’, not for me.”

She grins and bumps her shoulder against him. “You mean not just about ‘popping a heatsink’?” she teases. “It wasn’t just about that for me either, Garrus. I’m not sure where this is going to go, but it wasn’t just casual.”

Garrus nods and shifts next to her. She sees him look at the empty fishtank for a moment before he says, his gaze turning back to her, “What about Alenko?”

 _Damn it, Kaidan_. _Should’ve known you’d come up._ She shrugs. “You heard him on Horizon. He thinks I faked my death and that I’m a traitor. I don’t know how we can fix that, if he’s not going to believe me.”

“Shepard, sometimes people say things that they don’t mean,” Garrus remarks, “especially when they’re upset. _I_ was surprised to see you come striding into my base like you owned it—I didn’t believe it was you—and I wasn’t as close to you as he was. Alenko was a wreck when you died.”

“Mmm-hmm,” she says.

“He’d probably tried to forget you, move on. I would have. But then you came walking up to him like nothing had changed.”

 _God. He’s right._ “Yeah,” Shepard agrees, thinking it through. “Guess it would’ve been a bit of a shock to the system. He sent me a message, once he’d calmed down. I understand, but I—I….”

Garrus raises a hand. “If you’d rather go back with him, I understand, Shepard. He’s human, you have a history with him, and he’s got a hell of a lot more stability than a vigilante like me.”

She closes her eyes and sighs. “Are you _trying_ to push me back at Alenko? We were good while we lasted, but I’m not sure we can fix it. We’ve both moved on and I don’t know that he’ll ever trust me again. I’d _like_ to have him as a friend, but other than that?” She shrugs. “I don’t know. It’s not up to me—he won’t answer my messages. Besides, if I wanted a human, if I wanted stability, I wouldn’t be here, Garrus.”

“Fair point,” Garrus concedes, blinking at her. “Not as if you could get drunk at the bar and mistake _me_ for a human. Not even a particularly ugly one.”

She rolls her eyes and reaches for the discarded covers. “I think that was an insult to my species. Shut up, Vakarian.”

“Aye, aye, Commander.”

She can hear the laughter in his voice and thinks about smacking him with a pillow. Then she decides that a pillow-fight in her quarters is not the best use of the time before she has to be up. “Lights out, Garrus. Let’s get some shut-eye.”

“And here I thought you’d never say that.”


	30. Prompt: it takes only a few seconds to die

She grabs onto the edge of the airlock and holds on, determined not to look down. Gravity won’t win _this_ one. Her arms tremble and her muscles burn as she tries to pull herself up. If she falls here, she’s dead. _Again_.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Jack practically shoves Joker aside and grabs onto her. Tali grabs her other arm and between the two of them, they half-drag her into the safety of the airlock.

Tali seals the airlock and turns to her. “Too close, Shepard,” she says, worry thick in her voice.

“Another couple of seconds and….” Jack’s doing her best to sound like she doesn’t care.

“I know.” She follows Joker back into the cockpit, as EDI gives a countdown for detonation. “And if we don’t get the hell out of here, we’ll all be toast. Joker!”

“Workin’ on it, Commander. I do the impossible in a few seconds, just like you.”


End file.
